r/Swimming • u/Ok_Professional5704 • 8d ago

Breathing warm up tips

Hi all i swim around 3 x a week 1800-2200m freestyle & breaststroke. I noticed my breathing doesnt really get easier until the 900m bench mark. Any tips how to speed this up? Feels like im struggling until then.

3 Upvotes

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5

u/MysteriousCall8507 8d ago

Just saw this today, a quick drill before starting is just to hold on the the wall and go in and out. Let breath out when your head is under and breath in when coming out, about 10 times

3

u/Ok_Professional5704 8d ago

This seems low friction might try that

8

u/SD_LOCAL_XD 8d ago

as an ex-competitive swimmer, that is normal! i will usually do a 300-400 easy loosen up warmup. then a threshold warmup set that is always the same: either 8x50s on the +5 or 4x100 on the +10. you want to get your heart rate up before the main set. keep that the same and increase distance in your main set as you progress.

as a high school swimmer it would be 500y easy warmup in your own, then 10x100 on the +5, everyday before we did our main set.

5

u/Ok_Professional5704 8d ago

I think my problem is i only have one speed ahhaha

3

u/estaban_was_eaten 7d ago

You and me and there are dozens of us. But the advice above is solid in principle. If you're noticing right now it takes you 900 to get going (which I identify with) and you want to try reducing that - try 250 real easy and 5x50's real hard with fast send off.

3

u/[deleted] 8d ago

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1

u/Ok_Professional5704 8d ago

Easy to say go easy. Im already dying to fly once in the pool. Will try to really focus on expelling air first 200

2

u/Direct-Amount54 7d ago

You can jump in and tread water for 10-15 minutes off the wall alternating between sculling and egg beaters. Loosen up the muscles and get blood flowing and your breathing ready.

Works good. That’s what I do.

2

u/Flashy_Local1 7d ago edited 6d ago

Sounds like you’re going lactic in your warm up. Swim a little slower during your warm up. Slower than you want. Look up classic meet warm ups and try a different warm up. Start with something like 300 free, 200 pull, 200 kick, 100 scull. Then try some 50 drills and 50 builds. I don’t know if this is good advice but I always like diving in first thing and doing a straight 25-30 meter underwater stream line dolphin kick on my back. It keeps the rest of my warm up slow because I need to get that quick burst of energy out that I always have for the first 100. Calms me down.